Mourning
by namelesspanda
Summary: Companion one-shot to my Titanic AU, "Sinking Ship". After the wreck, Mary arrives in New York, and then later returns to Downton.


**A/N: A companion one-shot to my previous story. Upon returning to dry land (in America and then back at Downton), Mary must face life alone.**

* * *

April 1912, New York City

"Mary!" called Mrs. Levinson imperiously from the edge of the mob on the dock. "Over here!"

"Grand-mama," Mary said miserably by way of greeting, her face ashen and drawn as her grandmother helped her into a large coat. Pitiful moans of grief filled the crowd as one by one they gave up their hope of finding their loved ones on the Carpathia, and Mrs. Levinson's expression was grim.

"Come on," she said encouragingly, pushing Mary and Anna into the car. "Go," she ordered the driver.

Mary stared blankly out the window at the mobs of anguished and sobbing people, blurred faces left behind in the wake of the car. She knew their pain, their despair. But Lady Mary did not cry, Lady Mary didn't know what tragedy was other than a plot device in plays and novels.

"How're you feeling, dearie?" her grandmother asked, shifting in the leather seat and watching her concernedly.

"I'm…" Mary faltered. "I'm all right, I suppose." The words flopped flimsily as they left her, and Mrs. Levinson wasn't convinced. Anna's worried gaze moved between the two as the older woman harrumphed.

"All right?" Martha Levinson gave a sarcastic chuckle, but it was deceiving. She folded her arms and sharpened her voice. "No, you aren't."

"I'm…" She didn't have the will to finish. Anna seemed to shrink into her seat beside her, and Mary—who normally would have felt disgust for the person who cowered before either of her grandmothers—felt nothing.

"Care to explain?" Mrs. Levinson snapped.

"No," she said simply, and turned to the window.

"Where's your fiancé?" her grandmother said, more gently. "He was on board with you, wasn't he?"

"Yes," Mary said quietly, gaze still focused somewhere outside the window as the car pulled onto one of the main streets. Yes, her fiancé had been on Titanic. _I've decided, you know—my answer…it's yes._ "Yes, he was." The sorrow was evident in her voice and Anna knew she was not referring to Patrick.

"Do you know—?" Mrs. Levinson began.

"He's…gone," she replied numbly. Beside her, Anna shuddered, her eyes welling with the faintest hint of tears. "He's—"

"I'm sorry, dearie," said Mrs. Levinson genuinely. "Your mother said he was such a _good_ young man."

Such a good young man.

She needed to scream. It wasn't even just that she wanted to, but there was an absolute need for her to cry out—raw, visceral—and curse the world if she had to. God, she had to.

And it came out as a sob, unintelligible words stringing together as she doubled over and cried _goodbye and God bless you, Matthew, however much I might, creature of duty, I wouldn't take it from you,_ all crushed into one terrible cry of grief. Vaguely she noticed her Grand-mama patting her on the back, and she felt a darkness come over her. He was out there somewhere, floating, floating, sinking, gone. And here she was, alive and well and barely harmed and he was…dead.

"You all right, Mary?" said Mrs. Levinson ineffectually, worried.

Another sob, rough and terrible with pain. Dead.

"Milady—" Anna said brokenly.

"Damn you!" Mary lashed out, her voice cracking. Anna's face wrinkled, hurt and betrayed, and tears started to well in her eyes. It wasn't enough. "He should be here—not you—and _certainly not me_."

"Mary," her grandmother admonished, but there was no stopping her.

"We don't deserve it, you and I," Mary continued bitterly, tear tracks trailing down her pale cheeks. "We don't deserve it at all."

"Mary!" Mrs. Levinson said, louder. "Talk like that won't get you anywhere."

She wouldn't look up. Her breath caught in her throat again and she made a strangled noise, covering her face with her hands.

"Now when we get home, you'll go straight to bed," continued Mrs. Levinson with determination. "And it will all look better in the morning."

"This time it won't!" Mary cried harshly into her hands. "You're _wrong_, don't you see? It won't look _better._ Not ever."

"It always does," her grandmother answered. "It doesn't look like that right now, but it will."

Mary didn't answer, save a quiet sniffle into her gloves. Anna, still shocked into silence, stared at Mrs. Levinson, her eyes fragile and timid.

"There's no reason why you shouldn't be able to live a perfectly full and normal life," said Martha quietly. "Both of you."

"Just not a very happy one," Mary said with grim sarcasm, her words slurred by tears.

"Mary—"

"No," she interrupted, turning her head the slightest bit to glare at her grandmother. "You don't understand. You didn't have to watch him _die_."

Her grandmother looked horrified, her mouth falling open in shock. "Dearie—"

"_Don't_," Mary said through clenched teeth.

And Mrs. Levinson lapsed into silence, and the only sounds to be heard were the wails and whimpers of despair as they left the pier.

* * *

"Please try to eat, Mary," said Mrs. Levinson, staring pointedly at the heaping plate of food before her granddaughter.

"I'm not hungry," she replied indifferently, as though she were a small child.

"I don't give a damn," her grandmother said firmly, sipping from a glass of wine. "You have to eat."

"No." She avoided looking at the raspberry meringue, of all the inane things that she should be hung up on, surely desserts oughtn't to send her off into a fit—

"Could you bring up some brandy?" said Martha to the maid, who was hovering near the door.

"Yes ma'am," said the maid quickly and rushed off.

"I know it's been a shock," Mrs. Levinson said not unkindly, pushing away her plate and trying to meet her granddaughter's gaze. "It'll all look better in the morning—"

"You were wrong," Mary said, her voice hard. "I slept, I woke and it looks worse than before. Why on earth should I believe you now?"

The maid placed two short glasses of strong-smelling liquid in front of them, and Martha pressed one into Mary's hand. "It won't hurt to hope, you know," she said, and lifted her own glass to her lips.

"Won't it? I'm afraid it does," Mary answered bitingly, and she drank, swallowing without a wince as the liquid burned through her throat.

"Does it?" Her grandmother snatched the bottle from the maid and waved her away. "Did it really hurt when you were hoping?"

Mary allowed her grandmother to fill her glass. "Not—then. But now…" She shook her head and took a sip. "More than you could imagine."

Mrs. Levinson stared at her firmly. "I lost my husband, don't forget."

"Grand-papa was an elderly man found dead in his bed," Mary countered harshly, pouring herself more brandy and ignoring the stung expression on her grandmother's face. "Ma—_my fiancé _died before the age of twenty-five on a ship that couldn't be bothered to leave space for him on a lifeboat. I had to—to hold his hand as—" she broke off suddenly, bringing her glass to her lips and draining it.

"Who do you think _found_ your dead grandfather?" Martha demanded. "Or is God merciful enough to clean up the corpses?"

Mary stared at her.

"I know what you're feeling, dearie. At least a little of it." Mrs. Levinson picked up her glass and raised it to her granddaughter's. "To hoping."

Mary sighed and halfheartedly clinked her glass against Mrs. Levinson's. And then she wholeheartedly drank the remaining alcohol.

* * *

August 1912, Downton Abbey

Black. She'd always hated to wear the colour black. Yet that was what she wore as she stepped from the car in front of her childhood home, pausing to look up at all of it. She hated Downton at that moment, the estate that had tied her to Patrick and made her hesitant to throw him over when—

"Mary, darling," said her Mama in the accent that seemed all too familiar after months in America. "Welcome home."

"It's so wonderful to have you here again," Sybil put in.

"It must be a relief to be back," her father said.

"Yes," Mary said tightly, not even bothering to put on a false smile. "Yes, it is."

"Come in," her Mama said warmly. "It's been months, Mary."

Carson was waiting in the front hall, and she was reminded of how she and Anna had pictured home during those horrible hours in the boats. "Welcome back, milady," the butler said with a nod of his head.

"Thank you, Carson," she said coldly.

"Why don't you take a moment to change for dinner," her mother suggested. "Maybe Anna can—"

"Anna's not here," Mary said shortly.

"What d'you mean?" asked Cora, puzzled.

"She's decided to stay in New York," Mary told her crisply, walking towards the stairs. "When I ring, send O'Brien."

"You mean you abandoned her," Edith said spitefully, her face twisted into an odd expression.

Mary didn't answer, instead hurrying up the stairs and into her old room. Red papering glared in her eyes as she crumpled onto the bed, pins falling out of her hair and her hat too tight around her head. She'd left as a snobbish and ignorant girl, and returned as a bitter and damaged woman. And somewhere in between, she'd been lucky enough to be _Mary_.

* * *

"It seems that the heir after Patrick will be my third cousin, once removed," Robert announced to the whole family, pacing back and forth in the library. His gaze passed over all of them before landing on Mary, who was sitting perfectly straight, draped all in black. "A fellow by the name of Matthew Crawley."

Mary stiffened, suppressing the sudden tears that seemed to come all too often.

"What's he like?" Cora asked interestedly.

"He's a solicitor, in Manchester, it seems. I thought I'd run up to Grantham House and invite him and his mother there for a bit."

"You won't find him," Mary said at last, coldly casting aside her memories and tears. "He sailed on Titanic."

"_What?_" Robert exclaimed, whirling to face her. "I didn't find a record of—and how do you—?"

She forced aside the recollection of the sea air and pointless teas and middle-class prigs who dared to walk beside her. "I met him, you know. On board."

"Did he—?"

"Yes," Mary said tersely. A few precious days' worth of memories suddenly pressed against her eyes. "I—I'm rather tired, I'm afraid. If you don't mind—"

"'Course, 'course," Cora said soothingly, sympathetically.

"Thank you," Mary murmured as she passed. As she closed the library door behind her, the smell of salt and the sea air seeming to tingle beneath her nose, she heard her father's voice.

"Well, that's just horrible," Robert said disappointedly. "I'll offer his mother our condolences. If she wants us to take her in, I suppose…"

Mary reached for the wall as Robert's words subsided into the distance and suddenly another voice filled her mind. _You can find some—unsuspecting millionaire…you're going to make it, Mary._

"I didn't know _Mary_ cared that much for Patrick," Edith said scornfully, her voice raised to a high, desperate pitch.

Mary pressed her hand to her mouth and made a noise that sounded acceptably enough like a cough, and continued unsteadily down the hall, trying to keep the memories at bay.

She closed her door behind her and leaned against it, tears slipping past her well-worn eyes. Her black coat slid pathetically to the floor and so did her hat.

_Do you care for me enough to spend your life with me? If you don't, then say no. If you do, then…say yes…_

And it was then that she sank to the ground, sobbing quite uncontrollably and drawing her knees up to her chest.

* * *

June 1915

Sybil's screams pierced through the room, ringing off the mirror, the door, and echoing loud and clear into the ears of every Crawley woman (though Edith was a Strallan and had been for nearly a year).

"Tom—where's Tom?" Sybil demanded, and Mary flinched as her sister's eyes darted about the room.

Cora cast an alarmed glance at the doctor, who shrugged wearily. "Perhaps it would be—" she began.

"For God's sake, bring him!" Sybil managed, as another wave of pain crashed. She yelled again, and Cora sighed.

"Tom is right in the next room, Sybil darling," she tried soothingly, amidst her daughter's shrieks. "But I think it's best if he stay there—"

"We're already in Ireland," Violet sniffed. "And in a cottage, no less…it's much too hard to maintain a sense of propriety here. Why not—"

"No," Cora said sharply.

"Why not, Mama," Mary said loudly, taking pity on her screaming sister as she remembered a horribly cramped room that too smelled of blood—on the Carpathia, the too-late rescue ship. "We've never been able to stop her and Tom at much of anything."

"She has a point," her Granny agreed, banging her stick on the rough wood floor. "I seem to recall that you dismissed him as chauffeur, and the moment she could stand after that head injury"—she shuddered at the memory of that awful night of the count over a year previously—"she up and joined him here."

Cora's eyes were frosty. "No."

"For heaven's sake, Mama—" Mary crossed to the door and threw it open. "Branson? In here."

"Is it Sybil? The baby?" Tom demanded, rushing into the room. "My God. What—"

"Tom…" Sybil murmured weakly. "You've come."

* * *

_It is thirty-seven years before Mary sees _him_ again, thirty-seven long lonely years that certainly don't pass quickly. It seems as if there is nothing else to do but fall into the darkness as she waits for what seems like forever. _

_But in forever, she sees him. It's as he goes down on one knee and asks her properly after forty years that she realizes…_

…_hoping doesn't always lead to pain.__  
_

* * *

**End**_._

_**Please review, it means a lot to me. Thanks for reading!**  
_


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